


Genetic Compatibility

by rudigersmooch



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Considering abortion, Dubcon impregnation aftermath, Love/Hate, M/M, Mpreg, Rebelling while pregnant, Unexpected Pregnancy, drinking while pregnant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-02
Updated: 2019-05-02
Packaged: 2020-01-13 12:22:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18468889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rudigersmooch/pseuds/rudigersmooch
Summary: Damar has felt strange these past few months, and Weyoun 6 might just know why.





	Genetic Compatibility

**Author's Note:**

  * For [therescoffeeinthatnebula](https://archiveofourown.org/users/therescoffeeinthatnebula/gifts).



> I hope you enjoy this fic, recip! It was fun to write, and I hope you have fun reading it. :)

There was something odd about Weyoun 6, even by Vorta standards, and while it annoyed Damar greatly that he noticed the difference at all, it was disturbing on another level that it took him over a month to do so. In a perfect world, he would’ve been able to ignore the Vorta with impunity and never interact with another Weyoun again for as long as he lived, but since that was an impossibility in the current state of Cardassia, he at least expected to recognize the signs of Weyoun acting abnormally and respond accordingly. Allies they might’ve been in the most technical sense, but if Damar had learned one thing in his time as Legate, it was that a Weyoun acting out of character was somehow even worse than a regular Weyoun; for self-preservation, if nothing else, Damar should’ve noticed the differences sooner, and it said worlds for his state of mind that he hadn’t.

In Damar’s defense, what made Weyoun 6 odd was nothing that seemed dangerous on the surface. Had Weyoun been Cardassian, Damar would’ve said it was an improvement, since the most noticeable change was that this Weyoun listened and agreed more than he had before. While it could never be said that Weyoun 6 treated him with respect or admiration, it was at least true that he considered Damar’s words more carefully than his predecessor had, and that the innate disdain at Damar’s every suggestion had lessened. The fact that they were now of similar minds brought Cardassia and the Dominion to ever greater victories, and perhaps that was why Damar didn’t immediately notice the worst difference of the lot.

Weyoun 6 stared. 

To be exact, he stared often enough and long enough that Damar could feel those pale blue eyes boring into his shoulders when he was trying to concentrate on other matters, sometimes even when Weyoun had only been in the room for a few minutes. It was unnerving and irritating, and all the cooperation and improved temperament in the world didn’t make up for the fact that Damar could _feel_ the weight of Weyoun’s gaze settling in his bones. It churned his stomach like an unpleasant meal.

“What’s wrong with you?” Damar finally snarled, one day after a perfectly ordinary meeting. The Female Founder had spent the last fifteen minutes outlining what Damar was going to announce to the Cardassian people next and how he was going to arrange his men to better fight the Federation, and when she’d left the room, Damar waited for Weyoun to follow. The fifth Weyoun had always done so, trailing after the Female Founder like a pet; this one usually did the same, but there was a delay this time, more minutes during which he stared at Damar's back. After a month of holding his temper, Damar couldn’t manage it any longer.

“Why would there be anything wrong?” Weyoun said in perfectly measured response, and Damar clenched his fists against the control consul, briefly, before he turned. He almost hurled a bottle of kanar at his head, but it would’ve been a waste; at most, it just meant he would see Weyoun 7 the following morning, and be short of kanar tonight.

“If you have something to say, then out with it,” Damar said instead. “I have work to do, and I don’t have all night.”

Weyoun tilted his head, his expression placid.

“An interesting choice of words,” he said absently, in a voice characteristic of the Weyouns when they reflected on the oddness of the lives of regular solids. “Especially since that’s precisely what’s been on my mind lately.”

“You have things on your mind other than the Founders and the Dominion?” Damar asked, not quite able to keep the mocking tone from his voice. Weyoun usually returned the baiting with a comment on Cardassians or Damar himself.

This time, however, Weyoun merely ignored the comment as if it had never been.

“When a Vorta clone is activated, the Founders are able to remove some memories from previous incarnations if they choose,” he said. “It’s curious that they allowed me to keep this one.”

Damar almost asked 'which memory.' Almost.

The instant he opened his mouth, however, Damar felt a chill creep up his spine, and he knew. The realization struck him dumb for half a second, a silence that couldn't be matched even by his determination to sneer and snap.

Weyoun merely waited, like he expected Damar to have a conversation about this. Like he expected him to _want_ to.

Fortunately, if there was one thing Damar was good at, it was thwarting Weyouns at every opportunity. It was easy to turn away and ignore the fact that he'd been the one to bring it up in the first place, easy to ignore the fact that Weyoun was still staring.

“I don’t have time for this,” Damar said, and he pretended he didn't notice when Weyoun finally left. Nevertheless, it took several minutes more before he could force himself to concentrate on work again.

* * *

In terms of memories Damar tried to repress, he rarely revisited the one night he’d spent with Weyoun 5. It had barely been a night at all—a few hours by Damar’s estimate, though his perception was undoubtedly skewed by drink—and that brief period of time had done little more than make certain that every sip of kanar Damar drank for days afterward tasted like humiliation. He’d pushed the experience from his mind as much as he was able (an effort that was surely helped along by Weyoun 5’s ‘accidental’ demise not two weeks after the night in question) and then told himself that it was a memory best forgotten, with few consequences other than a few hours of soreness and a momentary prick to his pride.

That Weyoun 6 remembered the event was not ideal, but what he’d said was worse: that the Founders had _allowed_ him to remember it. Damar was familiar enough with the Founders to know that they didn’t simply allow things for no reason, and if he’d had to guess, he would’ve said that this particular memory—of solids being foolish and weak, and involving their precious _Weyoun_ at that—would’ve been one they wanted erased as quickly as possible. That they hadn’t done so made Damar suspicious, though it also explained a few things that he hadn’t thought to consider before.

Damar had felt…odd, these past few weeks. Not so ill that he visited a physician—it wouldn’t do to have a rumor start about his ill health, after all, or to give the Dominion a chance to build on it to their advantage—but enough that he’d noticed. Some days he couldn’t keep down food or drink no matter how hard he tried; the next, he’d be wracked with chills to his bones, or sleeplessness that couldn’t be chased away. Damar was no stranger to sleepless nights, but these ones had been odd, filled with shadows in the corners of his closed eyes and a helpless longing for home in the depths of his chest. That Weyoun was to blame seemed fitting, and although Damar couldn’t say exactly what he’d done when Damar had been at his weakest—poison? an attempt at mind control? an experiment?—it was comforting to know that it surely had an answer and an end. 

Now, getting Weyoun to discuss it or reverse it might be difficult, of course, but Damar was a Cardassian: somehow he’d manage, and it was with that determination that he started the next day. Since it was customary for them to review tactics and for Damar to submit a daily report each morning in the war room, that was where he waited with his day's first drink in hand. He rehearsed what he was going to say and how, but the words sounded clumsy and angry inside his head; they would have to do nonetheless, though Damar still anticipated Weyoun being stubborn about it.

When Weyoun walked in, the conversation didn’t proceed exactly as Damar had expected.

“I’m surprised with how much kanar you manage to drink, in your condition,” Weyoun said mildly, as if this was his standard morning greeting. “It’s truly impressive.”

Damar glared, and he took a deliberately long sip before setting the glass down.

“What ‘condition’ would that be?” Damar asked, with the possibilities once again running through his head. He didn't believe Weyoun would answer the question so freely, but that was another way this sixth one was odd: he volunteered information in a way the others hadn't.

“A genetic compatibility test, of course,” Weyoun said. “And a successful one at that.”

“Explain.”

“It’s very simple. My predecessor acquired a sample of your DNA and combined it with his own, and then deposited it in the first willing vessel.” Weyoun pursed his lips, and Damar hated that he remembered, with startling clarity, the look of Weyoun’s lips wrapped around him. ‘A sample of DNA’ - that was one way to put it. “You were willing, if I recall.”

Damar scowled. He felt like striking something, possibly Weyoun, but he settled for wrapping his hands around his glass. He still needed answers, since the one his mind was circling around was not possible.

“And ‘deposited’ it?” Damar felt a fool the minute the words left his mouth, because he knew how they sounded. He didn't need an explanation for what had occurred while Weyoun 5 had him on his back; instead, he needed to know _the purpose_ of this 'test.'

Weyoun did the first kind thing he'd ever done, to Damar's knowledge, and answered the question he'd meant to ask instead of the one he'd voiced.

“So it could grow, as children do.”

“That’s not—”

“Possible? I assure you, it is.” Weyoun smiled at him with the same superior air he cultivated anytime he thought Damar was asking a stupid question. “Don’t worry, Damar. It’s a temporary condition.”

“One that I intend to rectify immediately,” Damar snarled, and it was only because he was focused on Weyoun's smug, loathsome face that he noticed it. For an instant, there was a small fracture in the calm mask, an aborted reaction as Weyoun twitched at the words. Almost like he wanted to protest.

He didn’t, in the end.

“That’s your prerogative.” He glanced at Damar’s glass, expression once again placid. Damar was not fooled. “I suspect we’re not going to get much done today, and the Founders have need of me. If you’ll excuse me.”

Weyoun left the room as quickly as he’d arrived, and Damar let the news settle. He wasn't fully certain he believed it, but despite not trusting his Vorta ally, he did trust his eyes: Weyoun had reacted to their conversation in a way no Weyoun had reacted before, not that Damar had seen. 

Instinctively.

Since Damar had believed all Vorta to be programed, artificial things up to this point, the surprise he felt at seeing a true reaction from one was immeasurable. Whether Weyoun was being honest or not, there was something interesting happening, something that needed explored, and Damar thought about it for scarcely a second more before he tipped the rest of his glass back into the bottle.

* * *

Finding a doctor who would be appropriately discreet took longer than Damar had hoped it would, and after a few days of searching through Cardassia's finest in vain, he was forced to settle for one of his more taciturn cousins. Ruatt’s skills as a doctor may have been questionable, but Damar was willing to ignore it in favor of his merits as a secret keeper, a compromise he made easily once he decided that Ruatt wouldn’t be operating on him no matter the result. After all, the only thing he really needed to know at the moment was if Weyoun was lying or exaggerating, and Ruatt—with his fondness for illegal trading and Damar's repeated efforts in eliminating charges of such—was as ideal of a candidate for that as any.

Much to Damar’s shock, after a short examination, it turned out that Weyoun had been telling the truth. Damar wasn’t certain what to feel when he saw an image of the shape clouding the lower part of his torso, smaller than his fist and nestled safely near his stomach. There was room for it there, in an organ seldom used—male Cardassians were built that way, thanks to an evolutionary advantage from eons ago that had mostly been lost now—but it still didn’t seem real to him, not even when Ruatt helpfully informed him that the shape had a heartbeat.

“A heartbeat?" Damar did the calculations in his head—under two months, which made it fast for any intelligent species Damar had ever known. "So soon?”

“It’s developing rapidly. I estimate it will be viable in five months, possibly less.” Ruatt smiled at him timidly, open curiosity in his dark eyes. “It’s not Cardassian.”

“Not entirely,” Damar corrected, his eyes fixed on the image. _Not entirely Cardassian_ —that should’ve been the end of the matter, given what was at stake, but instead of saying as much, Damar left the examination with a short nod and a false promise that he would explain the situation to Ruatt at a later date. His feet carried him aimlessly after that, neither to his quarters nor the war room, and though it was not his habit, he used the time to think.

It was entirely unbidden but not surprising that his thoughts soon drifted to Dukat’s daughter. Dukat had been foolish about her in a way Damar hadn’t really understood, in a way that wasn’t very Cardassian or very Dukat. Damar’s reaction to that foolishness had been admittedly poor, and he regretted how that had gone, especially in the end. He couldn’t entirely forget Dukat’s face the last time he’d seen him, the anguish of it, and Damar frequently saw the girl’s face in his dreams too; a reminder, perhaps, of Damar’s mistake in thinking she'd been less important simply because she hadn’t been fully Cardassian. To Dukat, she had been worth everything, and that realization, that truth, made Damar wonder what this child was worth to Weyoun. An experiment, of course, but the Vorta had experiments aplenty; that alone couldn’t explain the way he’d reacted when Damar had mentioned being rid of it, nor did it explain why Weyoun 5 had impregnated _him_ in the first place.

Damar couldn’t very well make a decision without those missing pieces of information, or at least that’s what he told himself before he proceeded to ignore the situation entirely for three days.

As plans went, it was going well for him, until Weyoun ruined it.

“No kanar again today, Damar?” Weyoun asked out of nowhere after the conclusion of their weekly review. Weyoun had stuck close to the Female Founder these past few days, and Damar had seen very little of either of them; he’d considered it a blessing that Weyoun’s attention was focused elsewhere, considering that he still stared on occasion, his gaze now weighted with expectations. “You’d normally be several drinks in by now.”

“I can’t,” Damar said shortly. “It might kill it.” He hadn’t yet decided what to do about the life currently growing inside him, but it seemed unfair to poison it without cause, though his hands ached for a bottle even now.

Damar’s words made Weyoun pause for a second, and Damar wondered idly if it was in relief or confusion.

“I’m glad you’ve made that decision,” Weyoun eventually said with a slight bob of his head, and Damar snorted.

A Weyoun, glad? He hated to consider the possibility.

“I’m not doing it for you,” Damar said, the truth although he couldn’t say what his motivation was once Weyoun was removed from consideration. His head had been spinning lately, lips parched for the thick, sweet taste of kanar; it made it difficult to think clearly. “Whatever you think of me, I do know _something_ about parenthood.”

“Ah. I don’t.” Weyoun shrugged when Damar looked at him again, a distinctly un-Weyoun action to add to the others. “Vorta don’t reproduce in this fashion very often. We don’t really have children except, of course, when the Founders choose to allow it.”

“What’s the special occasion?”

“My predecessor hated you,” Weyoun said simply; he clearly didn't expect this to be a surprise to Damar, and it wasn't. “I think he saw this as a way to embarrass you.”

Damar snorted again. He should've been angry, perhaps, but instead he was merely tired; it wasn't like he hadn't brought this upon himself in many ways, first by the animosity and later by dragging Weyoun into his bed in some sort of petty attempt at shocking him. Damar's actions had been suspect for months, really—was it any wonder that there would be consequences beyond guilt and sorrow and Cardassian loss?

“That’s a poor reason to have a child.”

“Believe it or not, I agree.” Weyoun smiled and folded his hands. It was a very small smile, one that wasn't aimed at Damar, but perhaps at the shadow of his predecessor. “He hated you, and that clouded his thinking. I…would not have made the same decision.”

"You wouldn't have gotten the chance," Damar said firmly, and while it sounded harsh, that too was the truth. He hated Weyoun 6 in a different way than he'd hated Weyoun 5; it was a fact he didn't care to examine too closely. "And I'm not doing this again."

"I agree with that as well," Weyoun said, sounding amused. There was, however, a shade of another emotion underneath, beyond amusement or gratitude. "Thank you for doing it now."

Damar didn't correct him and say that he hadn't yet made up his mind, nor did he say that if he did, it wasn't because he expected thanks. At the current rate of replacement, Damar thought they'd be on Weyoun 8 before the child had to be removed; it would've been foolish to want words of encouragement from this one.

But since they'd been offered, Damar merely nodded an acknowledgement and hoped that the choice he'd impulsively made wouldn't ruin them all.

* * *

Weyoun and Damar reached a tentative truce from that point on, and Damar couldn't decide which part of that was odder: that he was in a position where he needed to make a separate truce with someone who had already allegedly been his ally, or that he believed said truce would actually hold. He and Weyoun were not friends and they didn't have to be, not as long as they were on the same side when it came to this war and this child, but Damar couldn't deny the advantages of having the Female Founder's trusted Vorta consider his perspective as something more than an obstacle for the Dominion to overcome. What's more, the changes that happened over the next few weeks convinced Damar that the differences between this Weyoun and the last were more significant than he'd first assumed, a fact that was never more obvious than when it came to the Breen.

Damar didn't care for the Breen, but he'd also not dealt with them extensively in the past. With the Female Founder deciding to open up negotiations for them to join the Dominion, however, Damar begin to see more of them, and he didn't care for the experience. It was obvious what role the Founders intended Cardassia to occupy from the moment the Breen alliance was struck, and that position—support, bodies for a war, a stock of territories for trade—was a disadvantageous one. Damar was merely a figurehead and always had been, and so his protests weren't considered anything but noise to the Founders, his presence nothing but an inconvenient necessity.

Weyoun, however, was a different matter.

When the Female Founder proposed giving a Cardassian planet to the Breen, Weyoun quietly cautioned that it might make the Breen too confident in their negotiations, and that they should offer something smaller instead. She agreed, and that was the end of it, until the Breen asked to be allowed access to confidential Cardassian information. Weyoun deflected that as well with an impressively skilled hand, and from that moment on, Damar paid close attention to every choice and offer he made during the negotiations. On the surface, they all seemed rational, but they were also distinctly favorable choices for Cardassia; it was a notable deviation from the situation of even a month ago, and it wasn't a change Damar could let pass without remark. 

When the meeting ended and Weyoun lingered behind after the others left, as had become his habit, Damar didn't make any move to rise from his seat behind the table. After a moment, Weyoun joined him, looking unsettled but curious.

"I thought Vorta served the Founders," Damar said, and though it wasn't a question, Weyoun answered automatically.

"We do, in all things," Weyoun said. "The good of the Dominion is our first priority."

"Is that so? Because it looked to me like you were undermining them. I don't know how she didn't notice."

"Do you think so?" Weyoun asked, and though the question sounded genuine, his tone was forlorn. "I had worried about that."

"About favoring Cardassia in negotiations with the Breen?"

"No," Weyoun said, but in contrast to his earlier sharing of information, he didn't explain further.

Damar should've left it at that. Would've, probably, if it had been simply a matter of politics and negotiations, two things that Damar had never had a talent for. But Weyoun looked almost ill where he sat, and Damar was—curious, to be sure. It was a rare poison that could touch a Vorta, after all.

"Is there something the matter?" Damar asked, and he was startled by how the words came out, in a tone much kinder than the last time he'd asked Weyoun a similar question.

"Only a small thing," Weyoun said, and perhaps because he wasn't used to needing to dodge a subject, his attempt at doing so was transparent. "How is the child today?"

Damar rolled his eyes but allowed the shift in conversation as a small kindness. As long as Weyoun didn't drop dead at his feet, whatever was wrong would surely pass.

"Alive and growing," he said shortly. It wouldn't be long before the curve of his armor could no longer hide it, but grow it did, unconcerned for the difficulties it would eventually bring its carrier. Damar could almost admire that: the seeking of life despite the risk and ramifications. "I doubt you need the details."

"In fact, I would…appreciate knowing them, if you're offering," Weyoun said, looking obviously hopeful. He even tipped forward a little into a listening posture, an unnecessary action considering Vorta hearing.

Damar was surprised but not opposed, and so he let himself answer the questions Weyoun obviously had but thought he couldn't voice. The child was growing steadily without complications, and now that Damar no longer drank kanar, the discomfort he'd experienced in those early weeks had also lessened. Given what Damar had observed in pregnant female Cardassians, he thought the process was going well, certainly better than predicted. 

It took several hours to satisfy Weyoun's clear curiosity, and it was the longest conversation they'd ever had; the longest amount of time, in fact, that Damar had ever willingly spent with _this_ Weyoun. By the time their discussion had drifted naturally to silence, Weyoun's coloring had improved somewhat from that near-translucent shade to his regular pale; Damar couldn't help but feel relieved despite his best efforts not to be.

"Thank you," Weyoun said. "This was helpful."

Damar didn't know what to say to that—such an odd thing, to be grateful for a conversation, even one about private matters. Of course, conversation was Cardassia's most abundant natural resource; it must've been different for a Vorta.

"As long as you're not ill," Damar said dismissively. "I don't think I'm ready to meet Weyoun 7."

Weyoun frowned at the words.

"Ill? Of course not." For a moment, his expression twisted, like he was fighting the urge to say more; it was a battle he lost. “There may be some…deterioration in the Weyoun line.” The words came quietly, clearly a confession he hoped Damar wouldn't hear. "I'm having…trouble remembering what side I'm supposed to be on. I don't know if my successor will be an improvement or not. You may find yourself dealing with another Vorta entirely."

As confessions went, this one was an unsettling one, and not only because the thought of another Vorta—not a Weyoun, and certainly not this one—disturbed Damar more than expected. Instead, Damar heard his words, and something about them touched a piece of his being, long-repressed and denied.

“Maybe you’re not deteriorating," Damar said slowly, "but evolving. Becoming more than you were.”

Weyoun looked contemplative at that, but Damar barely noticed: without meaning to, he had already begun to plan.

* * *

Once the haze of kanar was fully gone from his mind, Damar’s thoughts took an inevitable turn. He wasn’t much of a leader, not anything like what Cardassia deserved, but he’d been among the first to invite the Dominion to invade their planet and conquer their people; it seemed fitting that he be the one to finally tell them they weren’t welcome, that Cardassia had been bled and burdened long enough, and he intended to stand by that responsibility even if if killed him. That it might kill more than him—that it might snuff out the life inside him, along with those he cared for, those he touched—was a regrettable risk, but one that had stayed his course long enough. If nothing else, he wanted his children, all Cardassian children, to grow up proud, and he couldn’t see any way for that to be possible under the shadow of the Dominion.

That Weyoun wouldn't agree with him, not on this, was also inevitable, and so Damar took all possible steps to prevent him from finding out. It didn’t help, in the end: Weyoun still stared, and that meant he noticed when Damar’s demeanor changed, and when his answers became suspicious and furtive during the talks they had.

When Weyoun came to his quarters to confront him on the eve of the implementation of his plan, Damar was mostly just glad that he came without the Jem'Hadar in tow. It had been a gamble to say the least, but some part of Damar had known the risk was small; he only hoped that his instincts continued to be proven right this night, and that the evening ended with both of them the better for it.

As conversations went, however, the start was not promising.

“Rebellion,” Weyoun said flatly. “Are you insane?”

“I’ll have to call you back,” Damar said to a bemused Gul Rusot, and he ended the call before he turned his attention fully towards Weyoun. 

He looked angry, if such a thing was possible; his pale eyes gleamed like ice and though he did nothing as obvious as clench his fists, the tension was there when he stalked towards Damar.

“You’re the one who raised the possibility of being on the wrong side,” Damar reminded him, which had the calculated effect of making Weyoun stop in his stride, barely within reach. Physically imposing Weyoun was not, but Damar knew what strength anger could bring; he didn’t want to risk it, not now. "I decided you were correct."

"The Dominion has never lost a war, and any rebellion is crushed. The Founders _will_ not allow this.”

“Maybe,” Damar said, “but there are Founders on both sides.”

Weyoun wavered at that, long enough for a hint of guileless wonder to enter his expression. 

To Damar, it was another gamble proven true.

“You would contact Odo?”

“If I can get a message to him,” Damar promised. “I’d welcome the Federation’s help. And—yours.” Weyoun visibly startled at that last, but Damar continued. “You’re protective of this child, Weyoun. I’m not sure if you even realize it or recognize the feeling, but I do. It would be better if we were on the same side.” Damar wasn't used to cajoling or coaxing someone to his side, and so the words came out more abruptly than he'd planned. He hoped their honestly made up for that. “Know that I won’t cause it harm if I can help it.”

“I’m aware enough of my thoughts that I don’t need you explaining them to me, Damar,” Weyoun said, and the words were stiff with irritation, so reminiscent of Weyoun 5 that Damar almost went cold. “And I think that you are a _fool_."

When Damar had contemplated this confrontation, he had seen many routes it could take. What he had not considered in even his wildest imaginings was that Weyoun would punctuate his clearly negative opinion of Damar by cupping his face and laying a kiss upon his lips. It was startling in a way that a blow wouldn't have been, and new in the way his lips and hands were cool; the last time Damar had kissed a Weyoun, he'd been drunk, too drunk to notice any real details before they'd quickly progressed to other things.

This time was different, and not just because Damar was sober. When Weyoun pulled back, Damar had to swallow against the roughness of his throat.

"A fool, am I?"

Weyoun nodded and released him, only to stay standing right where he was.

"I told you that my predecessor hated you, and that I did not," he said, as though that was any kind of explanation. "I told you that the Weyoun line was deteriorating." He looked down, either at his feet or the curve of Damar's stomach. "I did not tell you that the Founders are experiencing difficulties of their own."

"I see." The news was not as surprising as it perhaps should've been. Damar had seen the Female Founder these past weeks, had wondered about her condition as she sometimes seemed to wither where she stood; he had mistakenly assumed it was temporary. "Then should you contact Odo, or should I?"

"I will," Weyoun said. "You will try not to get yourself killed, while we wait."

He didn't tell Damar to discard his plan or to wait for Odo to reply back before he acted; perhaps that's why Damar took the statement in the spirit it had been meant, rather than bristling at an unwanted order.

"I'd consider that reasonable advice, were it not coming from a clone."

"Clone or not, Damar, I have a vested interest in you, I, and our child surviving this," Weyoun said, and he looked up. There was nothing lascivious in his expression, but from this close, Damar couldn't help but remember Weyoun's mouth upon him, and the look on his face when he'd found satisfaction between Damar's thighs. That, too, would be different with this Weyoun. 

At the very least, Damar thought it might last a little longer.

"I'll try," Damar said, and it was as close to a promise as he could give.


End file.
